


Heat

by goldstraw



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - 1950s, Angst, Eventual Smut, F/M, Slow Burn, Unplanned Pregnancy, Weather as a plot device
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-01
Updated: 2017-05-21
Packaged: 2018-09-13 23:03:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 11,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9146017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goldstraw/pseuds/goldstraw
Summary: Summer, 1956. An unexceptional town, somewhere in the middle of America.“I saw a doctor.”“Down a back-alley? You in trouble, or something?” He shifted again, hand resting on his hat, as if he was about to run. Unease flared in her stomach. He was definitely trouble with a capital T but she didn’t want another dead person on her conscience. “Let me see your arm.”Updates every few days.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> It's been quite a while since I wrote anything (or at least anything worth putting up here), but I missed this pair too much.
> 
> Hope you enjoy reading this!
> 
> A few words of feedback would also be most gratefully received.

A man was shouting down the phone in fury, the bark in his voice making Brienne flinch.

“Cersei, goddammit, will you listen to me? I’m fine—

No.

No.”

Then his voice dropped into something more desperate.

“Please, can I just see you? We can go anywhere you like—

Cersei—

Don’t hang up—

Don’t—“

He looked at the receiver for a moment and then smashed it down. “Go to hell.” he muttered bitterly.

He strode over to the counter and tetchily motioned for a drink. “Make it a double.”

He swallowed it one gulp, sighed and then latched onto a pair of forget-me-not blue eyes staring at him.

“What are you looking at, boy?”

The man spoke with a cultured voice, but it had an edge of slackness, of disrepair in its drawl, loosened further by drink. It forced its way through her, blinking at the tone. The voice matched his face. Handsome bones and eyes you could fall into and never get out of again, but the skin was creased and touched with grubbiness and several days’ stubble roughened his strong jaw. His shirt was still just about white, sleeves rolled up, tie loosened around his neck. His hair was a dirty blonde and hadn’t seen a comb for a long time.

“Nothing,” she muttered, curling a shoulder away from him. She wrapped her fingers around her glass. The ice had melted already. The air was like soup, had been like that forever.

He whistled long and slow, his shadow falling across the shiny, sticky surface of the bar.

“My god… you’re a woman? And, yes, you were staring— _ma’am_.”

Her nose crinkled as alcohol seeped into the space between them. She kept her gaze firmly down. It wasn’t an unusual exclamation. Her considerable stature, short bobbed hair and broad shoulders were more male than female. Even the fact that her nose had been broken and poorly reset was not expected on a girl’s face. Add a heavy shower of freckles, made more numerous by the sun, and she was a source of easy ridicule.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Liar,” he snapped back hotly.

Her eyes flickered over the arm that nearly touched hers. It came to an unfamiliar end, short of a hand. A bandage was tied haphazardly around it.

“I seen worse than that,” she said, drily. “Don’t worry. People rarely _notice_ anything, even when they’re looking.”

He snorted. “And I’ve noticed that you’re as ugly as a mule, ma’am.”

She caught his gaze and held it. His eyes, green as grass and bright like sun on dew, laughed at her scowl.

“Do you think you’re the first that’s seen that about me?”

His left hand rubbed his chin. “The whole world would have to be blind if I had been, ma’am. Hell, even if I was the only man left on earth, you’d be somewhere far down my list, if you catch my drift? Having survived that far, I wouldn’t want to be flattened.”

She blushed, a trickle of sweat running down her neck as she looked back down.

“Was all your politeness in that hand, or are you just foul through and through?”

That made him laugh. “The latter, ma’am.”

“Stop calling me that.”

“So is it that your voice hasn’t broken, boy?”

“No. I mean— I… I’m a doctor, not some eighty year old deserving of your phony respect.”

“Doctor.” He said it meanly, a sneer on his lips. He picked up the glass and drank in long, loud gulps. “Suits your high and mighty manner I suppose, all puritan—“

She grabbed his wrist in one swift moment, pinning it to the bar. She could feel him trying to pull away and then stopping abruptly when he yelped in pain. He jolted her, snarling. Had she been the size of other girls she might have been frightened by the loom of his body, but she could match him for size of shoulders and breadth of torso.

“Pipe down, mister—“ she said evenly.

“Let me go, you—“

Her fingers pressed a little deeper. He went white, sweat glistening on his upper lip.

It wasn’t easy looking at the fury on his face. A long second or two passed until he finally broke the stare. She lifted her hand away, watching him cradle his arm.

“What about do no harm?” he hissed, looking round to the other patrons to see if the incident had been noticed. He needn’t have worried. Only old men and drunks in the corner, and a bar man who had ceased caring many years ago.

“You deserved it.”

“You’re still a goddamn menace.”

“Shouldn’t you still be in hospital?”

He shook his head violently, finishing his drink. “No. Shouldn’t you? Or is midday drinking good for the patients?”

“It’s not alcoholic. This is the only place with ice left.” That said, it would have been easy for her to forge a drinking habit. She had many things she wanted to forget. Nobody would give a damn. She shrugged at the man. “You actually gone to hospital at all?”

His face twitched, gaze darting about.

“No?” she scolded. “You’re more than a fool.”

“I saw a doctor.”

“Down a back-alley? You in trouble, or something?” He shifted again, hand resting on his hat, as if he was about to run. Unease flared in her stomach. He was definitely trouble with a capital T but she didn’t want another dead person on her conscience. “Let me see your arm.”

“No.”

She tutted at his obnoxiousness.

“Let me see,” she ordered, her own palm held upwards, waiting.

His bright eyes narrowed in suspicion but he didn’t move. She took that as consent. Leaning forward, she took his arm in between them, gently unravelling the loops of bandage. It was on the edge of infection and the work was shabby and unsophisticated. She told him so.

“Let me take you back and get some drugs at least?”

“I told you, I’m not going anywhere near a hospital.”

She shook her head and tutted again, as she carefully re-wrapped the injured arm. The muscles in his forearm twitched and bundled as the hurt took him.

“You’re a fool.”

He growled. “So you keep saying, damned woman. I didn’t ask you to get involved.”

Brienne let out an outraged noise. “You interrupted me! And were rude with it. I’m offering you help, as is my duty—“

“Duty?” he said savagely under his breath. “You a real saint, you know that? Duty is a damned curse. Duty is what got me like this.”

She blinked at him. He was a like an opaque vortex; she felt herself being pulled into something odd and dark and dangerous. Her life was boring, plain. Things like this – men like him – were the nuggets of someone else’s gossip.

“I gotta go,” she said quickly, putting a note down on the bar. She tried to sense if he was following her into the white-bright sun, but refusing to look back, she jumped out of her skin when his hand landed on her shoulder as she unlocked her car.

“Leave me alone!” she cried. “I swear to god if you—if you— I will scream for the cops.”

“Hey, doc – calm the hell down. I ain’t one of those types—”

“No?” she stuttered, trying to find her keys.

“No. And you’d kill me stone dead if I tried anything, I reckon,” he added, pointedly. “Anyway, I am a goddamn cop.”

The burning wind picked up, litter spun in eddies round their feet.

“You are?” she asked, doubtful. He was so different from any cop she knew. Slippery and enough edges to cut herself every time she moved.

Jaime dropped his gaze to his arm, thrumming his fingers on the metal. “I was.”

“Can you get off my car, please?” she asked quietly, running her hand over her face. Gods, she was tired.

It took a moment before he reacted, but then he nodded and moved away, still distracted.

She got in and started the car, but then hesitated. He’d come after her for a reason, hadn’t he? She rolled down her window, squinting against the sun. “Did you want something? You followed me…I…” she trailed off.

He flashed a grin at her, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “Don’t worry about it, doc. I’m a big boy, I can look after myself.”


	2. Chapter 2

Two hot days later - the heatwave continued deliriously – Brienne was accosted once more.

“Hey you, doc, with the attitude and the blue eyes,” hissed the man as she walked out the doors of the hospital for her break, though the scorching air was not refreshing at all. She had to shadow her face to see who it was against the sun and found it was the man from the bar.  He looked worse, gaunt and frantic.

He motioned to a corner and she followed him reluctantly. “I told you to go to hospital,” she muttered as she felt for his pulse, finding it thready. His skin was hot to the touch.

“I’m here, ain’t I, doll? But I need to keep a low profile.”

She frowned at him. “Why?”

“It’s complicated.”

He near enough showed his fangs when she gave him a disbelieving look.

“You’re going have to do better than that.”

“Can I rely on your discretion?” he asked fretfully.

She looked even more confused. “There’s doctor-patient confidentiality—“

“You stick to that?”

“Of course,” she snapped back, crossing her arms across her white coat defensively, not liking the way this was going.

He took a breath. “I’m Jaime Lannister.”

Her mouth gaped for a second – she wasn’t a hermit, she knew the name and the kind of world it represented, and could have kicked herself for not recognising him. Grubbier, shiftier— yes, but it was definitely him.

Jaime smiled thinly. “Enough with the goldfish impressions—“

“Sorry,” she swallowed, suddenly aware of the magnitude of the situation.

“And your name is?” he prompted. “Or I have a selection of names you might prefer— doll, wench, giantess—“

She scowled. “Dr Tarth. Brienne Tarth.”

“Charmed, I’m sure. So, you going to help me or not?”

“I’m not going to break any rules for you.”

He rolled his eyes. “Seven hells— I’m not asking you to commit the crime of the century here but can you just put a different name down? I’d like to keep my face out of the papers if at all possible.“

She heard the edge of pain in his voice. She closed her eyes and sighed. “ _Fine._ But you have to explain everything when we’re done, okay? I’ll take you through the back _.”_

He nodded after a moment and she bathed in the sharp attention he gave her with those wickedly green eyes.

She gave him a shot of morphine but unwrapping those awful bandages, having to debride the stump and re-suture made Jaime whimper something awful, trying to stop himself screaming. Perhaps it was the seriousness of his injuries and the fact that he was all alone that clawed at her sense of responsibility once he’d been patched up. That was certainly her rationale behind the idea of letting him sleep on her couch, a body curled up childishly, helped into obliviousness by serious drugs.

His groggy groans when he woke hours stirred her from her studies.

“Hey,” she murmured, coming close enough to see his muscles twitching as if he was a bird wanting to take flight away from danger. “Do you remember where you are?”

“Yeah, doc. I lost my hand, not my mind—“ He tried to sit up and blanched again.

She bent down to help him. “Take it easy. You’re still running a fever.” His shirt was damp with sweat. He needed a bath, clean clothes. She might have some things that would fit him, but suddenly the prospect of having him here, in her home, in some kind of fix, was overwhelming.

“Don’t fuss,” he barked, shrugging off her touch.

She pulled away at his demeanour. “Don’t try me, Lannister! I could have got in trouble today— and I’ve got tests next week that I have to pass. Not that anything I’ve read tonight has gone in. It’s kind of difficult to concentrate when I have the infamous scion of one of the wealthiest families in the country asleep in my house. I didn’t need to do all this for _you_.” _Of all people_ , she finished silently.

“Alright, doll, no need to throw a fit—“

“It’s Brienne,” she said. “Remember that?”

He rolled his eyes.

“You were going to explain what happened,” she prompted, hearing the mulish tone of her voice but not caring at this precise point in time.

“How old are you?” he asked, bringing his gaze back up to her.

“Err… Twenty-four.” His face softened slightly, but she held up her hand to stop him speaking. She didn’t need to hear yet another man exclaiming at her youth, or her inexperience. “I don’t see what that has got to do with anything.”

“You’ll have been old enough then to have seen the _Kingslayer_ headlines, then?”

He’d disarmed her again, slipped under her defences with an unexpected question that left her stranded, far from what she thought she knew.

“Yes?” she responded, uncertain. Old enough to have heard the adults talk about it in shocked tones. Young enough to have built up this picture of something terribly wrong.

“Will you sit down, doc? I don’t bite. Much.” He grinned wolfishly. “I know I have a debt to pay. I am a Lannister deep down after all.”

She sat, out of arms reach.

“I am... was… an undercover cop.” His gaze darkened. “Someone had the bright idea of using the Kingslayer incident as a cover story for me. _High flyer cop kicked out of the force is embittered, seeks revenge_. Criminals lapped it up, couldn’t resist using me in and against the establishment. Well, until I set them up. I was careful. I didn’t get away with too many lucky escapes over the ten years. But then my father’s enemies grew a backbone, found me, threatened to uncover me for leverage. Shame my father couldn’t care less. The police washed their hands of me as well. So the crooks did this instead.”

He looked haunted, hunted, and yet he was sitting there like this was just a normal event. He’d elbowed his way into her quiet life, telling her stories that should have been on movie screens.

“That sounds…complicated,” she said, struggling to find the right words. “Living a double life for ten years—“

“I got used to it. Got used to lying.” He clenched his fist. “Becomes easy never coming up for air. But now, I’ve been pulled out by the scruff of my neck. It hurts like hell.”

Her brow puckered in concern. “Do you have other family? Would they be worried?”

“They know I’m alive. Flawed though now, so I might as well be dead to some of them,” he added grimly.

A pain lodged somewhere near her heart at the thought. All her family were gone. She’d give anything to see them again. “I’m sorry.”

He grunted.

Brienne hesitated. “Do you have a home to go to then?”

“You only have to ask me if you want me gone,” he barked.

She huffed at his unreasonableness. “Did I say that? No, you need to recover. You’re welcome to stay in the guest room of course while you do.”

He paused as if he was almost surprised, taking her in. “That’s generous of you.” 

“It’s what anyone would do.”

He scoffed. “It isn’t. Not for Lannisters anyway.”

She stood up, her fingers fidgety, ready to flee. “I’ve got an early shift tomorrow so I might be gone by the time you wake. Will you still be here when I get back?”

He grimaced in pain as he too stood. “I won’t run away, don’t worry, doll.”


	3. Chapter 3

There was no talk at the hospital of him, nothing in the newspapers strewn in the staff room. She was relieved. The last thing she wanted was the police or anyone else knocking down the front door. He needed rest and recuperation. She could see the trauma in his eyes however prickly he was. She hoped he was alright while she tried to hurry through her shift at the hospital but the hours passed so slowly she swore her watch was broken. Dashing home, she breathed a sigh of relief when she rounded the corner of the house and found him on the shady back porch, dozing. He’d changed into the clothes she left out, an old short sleeved shirt and a pair of beige knee length shorts, bits from her dad’s wardrobe that she still hadn’t managed to throw out. He somehow managed to look both completely at home in them, and just like he’d stepped out of an advert for a classy holiday on the French Riviera.

“Hi,” she said clearly so as not to startle him as she walked up to him. “I’m back.”

He yawned and scrunched up his face. “Doll.”

She flinched. No one ever used it as term of affection for her. “ _Brienne_. How are you feeling? Did you sleep well?” She put her hand on his forehead. He stiffened, looking somewhat aggrieved at her intrusion into his personal space, but she didn’t notice. “Hmm. Getting better. But I have to change your bandages—“ He pulled a face but Brienne just shrugged. “Look, it needs doing. And then you can relax.”

“Relax? I’m bored as hell, doc. I’m not used to doing nothing.”

“You’re more than welcome to read any of my books—“

“Not my idea of fun.”

“Oh.” She quailed slightly. Reading was her idea of heaven. “I have a record player, a few records.  What do you normally do when you’re not working—“ She slowed to a halt. He wouldn’t have had much time off in his “job” she realised.

He stretched his limbs with a low groan, the carnal smile that followed hinting at things that made Brienne feel very naïve. “I had a distraction. A beautiful, tempestuous, high heels and red lipstick kind of distraction—“

_Of course there was a woman._ She remembered the phone call in the bar. Was that her? Even her name had sounded exotic.

“—the only one for me, until I wasn’t the only one for her any longer. Not having lost a paw and the scales from my eyes.”

Brienne remained silent but red. There was nothing she could even think to say. Relationships strayed into unexplored territory on her map – _here be dragons!_

He ground his jaw, rubbing his toe into the dusty wood. “I guess this is the first day of the rest of my life.”

“Come on Jaime, this isn’t going to defeat you—“

He snapped his head up. “No? Perhaps it would have been better if I had died rather than be left lame and useless—“

“I don’t deal with pity.” Brienne said firmly. “It’s terrible what happened to you. I’m not suggesting it isn’t. But you live, you breathe—“

He snorted. “Enough with the sermons! I don’t want to be cheered up or patronised, I just want to sit here and drink and not feel anything anymore.”

She should have bitten her tongue but— “Then why did you come looking for me? Ask me for help? I know why. You wanted to live! The desire to survive is the strongest thing there is. And as what happens next, you don’t need to figure it out straight away. Take a moment. But everyone can make something of their situation. You can do whatever you put your mind to.” She felt breathless. Where had that come from?

Even though he wasn’t looking at her, she could tell he was listening. “You have a lot of confidence in someone you barely know.”

“It’s what I believe.”

She could feel his scepticism radiate out, tainting the air.

“I’ll be inside, when you’re ready,” she said, turning for the backdoor.

“I’m coming, I’m coming, okay—” A long sigh escaped him as he stood. “Just my luck I get the stubborn, idealistic doctor with a face for radio. Where the hell is the pretty nurse who just smiles nicely and talks shit—“

She clenched her jaw, pretending not to notice his slur as they sat at the kitchen table. She began to dress the wound, pausing for a second here and there as she felt Jaime having to take stuttering breaths to keep the pain at bay.

“I’m sorry,” she murmured as her head bent over his arm. “Nearly done. There—“ as she tied the final bandages.

“What made you want to be a doctor?” he asked abruptly, his eyes still closed in agony.

She dropped her gaze to her bitten nails and working hands. “My mother died when I was young. I felt so helpless… I never wanted to feel that way again.”

A silence developed between them before Jaime spoke again. “My mother also died when I was young. Giving birth to my brother.”

She looked up at him. “It’s the worst.”

He nodded after a moment.

“Why did you become a cop?” she asked quietly. “If you don’t mind me asking.”

“I do mind you asking, doc. But I swear to all the Gods, I will go crazy if I don’t talk to _someone_ —“

She rolled her eyes without thinking. “Well, I am honoured! It is a sheer delight, I’m sure you’ll agree!”

He stared at her before giving a bark of laughter with perhaps the first genuine smile she’d seen on him. He leaned back, looking at the ceiling. “I just wasn’t excited by making money. I saw my father run the business like a medieval kingdom. He ruined people’s lives to increase his profit margin. It just didn’t sit well with me, I wanted to do something that meant more, that was for the greater good. I guess every family has a black sheep. I ended up joining the police. I found out I wanted, liked to see justice done. I was even good at it, until—“ he stopped. “My father didn’t exactly disown me, but he made his feelings known. He doesn’t like a rebel.”

Brienne squinted at him, the warm rays of the setting sun highlighting his blond hair and cheekbones through the window. She so rarely had the chance to speak to interesting people, and whatever else Jaime Lannister was, there was no denying he was interesting. There was something real there in the man sitting opposite her, underneath all the brashness and self-deflecting remarks that intrigued her, despite herself. Their previous conversation had replayed in her head all day and more scraps of her memories around the Kingslayer incident bubbled up. It jarred now with her after hearing what had motivated him.

“What _did_ happen back then?”

His eyes flickered into stormy, sea green pools and his whole demeanour darkened. “Oh, how many times have I seen that look, disgusted but curious. You’re like the rest of them—“

She scowled. “Give me some credit, Jaime. Have I judged you on what you’ve told me so far, have I betrayed your trust? Let me make my own mind up once I’ve heard the truth,” she challenged, finding strength from somewhere.

He contemplated her fiercely, enough to make her redden but she held his gaze. She was being examined and feared in the dismissive look etched on his face, that she would be found wanting. He dropped his gaze to his injured arm for a long moment.

His eyes flickered back to hers with some kind of resolve burning in them. “The truth? Alright. I’ll tell you.”

He stood abruptly, pacing to the doorway to look out onto the garden again, just about dark now. He was so quiet that she wondered if he had decided not to tell her after all. “After the war, a lot of veterans joined the NYPD. Brought in a mentality that was paranoid at best, dangerous as worst. I was a rookie, keen to please. I ignored a lot of the bad stuff. Did what I was told, proved myself. But then the chief brought in this guy, nicknamed the King, to front our campaign against organised crime. The King wanted to take on the world himself. Saw himself as the saviour of us all. Everything was black and white to him. He would do anything to destroy the mob. Wanted to remove it root and branch. Took a… err… slash and burn approach. Literally. Burning down warehouses, homes – he didn’t care if people were in them, even innocent bystanders. Then it came to his attention that this mob chief was laundering money through a nursery. Kids, you know. He wanted to use the same methods. _Smoke the bastards out and see their ill-gotten gains go up in flames._ I tried to reason with him, I tried to get his superiors to stop him but they ignored me—the King got results, didn’t he? He was going to do it. He was going to burn the place down with the kids inside. So I shot him as he was about to hurl a Molotov cocktail in. I only wanted to injure him so he would stop, but as I pulled my gun he pulled his and shot me.” His hand went instinctively to his shoulder. “My own shot went into his chest rather than his arm.”

She couldn’t have torn herself away even if she had wanted to. She knew secrets, lies, damned dishonesty ruined lives, but this was something beyond that. A spark of anger mirroring his bloomed in her blood. “Gods, Jaime— that… I… why didn’t you say anything? All those headlines were wrong! You could have cleared your name.”

He scoffed. “Of course I tried to explain, doll. But they didn’t want to hear it. They just blamed me. I was too young to put up a fight. Or to fight hard enough. Easier to dirty the name of one cop rather than the whole force.”

“For what it’s worth, I think you did the right thing,” she said, after a long while. It didn’t make sense, but Jaime made more sense. Another jigsaw piece from a box without a picture found its home.

He turned back to her, looking as if something had eased and settled within himself. “It feels like the only right decision I’ve ever made.” He sighed heavily, an eyebrow raised. “You’re the first person I’ve told since it was all hushed up.”

She blushed at the honour bestowed on her. “Really?” she asked, watching his face, that handsome, sad face, and felt her world as she knew it begin to waver and change.

“You seemed the right person to tell. The right moment.” He shrugged, as if embarrassed.

“I’m glad you could trust me with it. I appreciate it, thank you,” she said softly, hoping he believed her.

He nodded abruptly, turning back to the garden. She took that as her cue to leave.

“Goodnight, Jaime.”

“Goodnight, Brienne.”


	4. Chapter 4

Somehow, Brienne gained a lodger – a knife sharp, bright burst of cynicism with a tendency towards depression if left too long to stew – and a patient, who was testily resistant to having any constraints on his independence. He required both kid gloves and those gloves you wore when dealing with thorny brambles, but how quickly she found herself looking forward to coming home to him. He was right about having someone to speak to, someone outside work, who didn’t expect her to solve problems or deliver bad news. Instead she sat on the porch with her books and watched Jaime stalk round the garden under the endlessly blue sky. He even attempted to cook something after she had sat her exams, hiding his pride in her praise with the usual sarcastic retorts, although as she pointed out with triumph, his smile somewhat undermined the impact of his insults.

But he hadn’t left the house in weeks and it was getting to him.

“I ain’t one for morning small talk, doll,” he grumbled as she merely tried to make conversation on Saturday morning.

“ _Brienne_.”

He grunted into his cup of coffee.

“You’re getting a like an old lion in a zoo, pacing and getting annoyed.”

“Less of the old, if you don’t mind. Or I will turn on my keeper and eat them.”

She gave him an unimpressed look. “Well, I thought I might go to this new big grocery store at the edge of town. Do you want to come? No one will recognise you, I’m sure.”

He groaned theatrically. “I used to go to fancy restaurants and then dancing, but if this is your idea of fun—”

“It’s not my idea of fun either, actually, but we need food, and I heard they have stuff frozen—“

At that, Jaime pricked his ears up. Even early mornings were now sweltering. The old farmhouse didn’t have air conditioning and so it was a case of trying to find the slightest draught. Move too quickly though, and you found yourself having to immediately mop your brow.

“Alright, then. What the hell are we waiting for?”

Brienne was just checking her list, half an eye watching Jaime pick up and put down cereal boxes like an overactive kid when she heard a stomach churning wolf-whistle behind her.

“Well, if it isn’t Big Brienne? And who’s this? Your fancy man?”

She caught Jaime’s raised-eyebrow-glance as they both turned. He was unusually completely unreadable. Her heart sunk.

“Ron,” she said tersely.

“Aren’t you going to introduce us?” asked Jaime quickly. She certainly didn’t want to play this game; she couldn’t bear to look at Ron and couldn’t predict what Jaime would do next.

Ron grinned and stuck his hand out. “Ron Connington, owner of the fine car dealership across the way.”

Jaime didn’t offer a hand in return. “And how do you know Brienne?”

“Oh, we go way back—“ he gave a dirty laugh. “Huh, Brienne? Right?”

She could barely offer a nod at her shoes.

“I see,” replied Jaime, his voice icy cold.

“Word of advice, pal— if you’re trying to screw her, then I wouldn’t bother. She’s frigid through and through—“

At his words, her breath suddenly stuttered as if she had got her wish and was crumpling up and disappearing into a black hole. But all she felt was a slight jolt as Jaime slipped an arm around her waist and pulled her close. Brienne watched confusion cross Ron’s broad face as he flicked his gaze between them. He was too stupid to realise their body language told a different story – her stiff limbed with dread, his waiting to pounce.

Jaime laughed with little humour. “My, my, you’re quite a catch. You had much luck talking about girls like that?”

She put a hand on his arm. “Jaime—“ she warned.

Ron chuckled nervously. “I’ve got no fight with you, pal—“

“You do, with that mouth.”

“Giving you fair warning, is all. Seems like you’re new in town, maybe? I didn’t catch your name—“

Jaime stepped forward, using his height to its full advantage. “I didn’t fucking give it, but I will be your worst nightmare if you don’t high tail it out of here.”

Ron started to look flustered, which wasn’t hard. “Excuse me?”

“You heard.”

Ron suddenly turned to Brienne, smirk on his lips, hoping to find an easier target. “How have you managed to hide the fact you’re a freak for so long—”

Before Brienne could stop him, Jaime took a step forward and punched him hard, despite his awkward left hand. Ron stumbled backwards, causing the display behind him to topple over with a crash. “What the hell?” he groaned from the floor, trying to back away in a four limbed scuttle.

Brienne had to swallow hard to get rid of the nausea appearing as she took in the scene before her eyes. “Weren’t you taught not to escalate situations?” she muttered, finding it hard to breathe. She needed to escape, but the door was nowhere in sight.

“Hey, doll—“ he grabbed her hand as she began to wander away. “What the hell was that about? You don’t seem like a damsel in distress, but he—“

She spun round. “It’s none of your goddamn business! And I didn’t need you to defend me!”

His eyes widened and flared in fiery anger. “Yes, you did. You were letting him getting away with that bullshit!”

She scoffed bitterly. “That was nothing. I’ve heard it all before and been through worse.”

“So? Believe me, if there is one lesson I’ve learned, is that if you say nothing, everyone believes the other guy. I thought you were a fighter,” he hissed.

Having his fury directed at her was too much. The hurt, the embarrassment, the sheer unfairness of it actually being the truth engulfed her. She pushed him away. “You have no right judging me!” she forced out, her voice catching in her throat. Tears pricked her eyes and she fled.

In the sanctuary of her unbearably hot car, she sobbed uncontrollably. She tried, failed, to stop when the passenger door opened and Jaime sat down in silence. She couldn’t look at him, couldn’t find the energy to wrack her brains and find some platitude to say. She sniffed, coughed, sniffed again in snivelling humiliation. Jaime reached into his pocket for a handkerchief.

“Here—“

She snatched it from his fingers with hopeless gratitude, trying to calm herself with deep breaths. “Sorry—“ she blurted into the air. “Sorry.”

“You don’t need to apologise—“

Her shoulders sagged. Couldn’t he just accept her sorry and move on so she could stuff this particular memory into an already cramped box of things she never wanted to think about again?

He tutted in exasperation. “What I said was uncalled for. It was wrong.”

She looked at him incredulously, trying to blink away more tears. “No, it isn’t. It’s the truth. I thought ignoring them would protect me. It hasn’t. It’s just… I have had to fight every day of my life. To overcome what my father wanted of me, to escape – even if only for a few years – to become a doctor and not the nurse everyone thought I should be,” she breathed a ragged sigh.  “You end up here, in my life and in this town on the road to nowhere and it looks easy to change everything, act differently. I only wish I…”

Jaime looked at her patiently while she scrunched the handkerchief between her hands on her lap. He deserved an explanation; god only knew what he made of her. A grown woman _sobbing_. And he deserved the truth, the whole horrific truth. But to tell him, to actually speak the words was a daunting thought. Two realisations slowly dawned on her, however. She trusted Jaime, and he had _defended her._ No-one had done that before, not really.  

She tried to keep that in mind as she cleared her throat. “I grew up with Ron and his gang. They took a special pleasure in tormenting me. Made my life hell. And then in high school, it stepped up a gear.” She closed her eyes, seeing every moment on a loop of film that never seemed to fade. “They, as I found out later, decided to have a bet who could get me into bed first. I was an idiot, desperately grateful for their attention, as they sat with me at lunch, hung out after school.” Her voice filled with self-loathing as she continued. “Ron was the one who got closest. Dates. Gifts. Eventually a teacher put an end to it, blaming me rather than the line backer.”

Anger made Jaime’s whole body twitch. “Huh. I’ll go back and kill him if you want.”

The edge in his voice made it quite clear he wasn’t joking. She was just relieved Jaime hadn’t run away, a faint doubt, but still it lingered. “I just want to forget it. Try to, at least.”

He shifted in his seat, turning towards her. “Has anyone ever told you you’re too kind for this world?” he asked softly. She tried to object. “I mean it, Brienne. You blame yourself but you did nothing wrong. _Nothing_. And you’re right, I am an outsider. And I always like taking down bullies. So I will be your shield or your sword, for as long as you’ll have me.”

She bit her lip in trepidation, aware of how seriously he looked at her, at how his jaw clenched round the words. She wanted desperately to find the bravery to run her fingers across that jaw, palm against his cheek, to simply feel him— but as the moment grew longer, and his eyes went fractionally darker when they flickered between her eyes and her mouth— she looked away with a start, the bright light blinding her. Whatever she longed to do, she couldn’t, she wouldn’t, ruin a friendship, her only precious alliance. Because she would ruin it. Of that, she was sure.

So she tried to rearrange her features into something resembling normality and moderate her voice and ignore the wounded look on his face.

 “Come on,” she said evenly. “Let’s go home.”


	5. Chapter 5

Something changed after that. No longer the easy company or the contented rhythms of the previous weeks but instead sharp frustrations, awkward moments of passing each other in doorways as if they couldn’t bear to be in the same room together anymore. And when they did see each other, Jaime always seemed to want to say something and then swallowed whatever had been on the tip of his tongue. Brienne descended into paroxysms of redness as never before, even by her own high blushing standards.  The cool hospital became her refuge again and she felt like she hadn’t smiled in days. Of course she had spoilt it, hadn’t she? Everyone was right. She was a freak and now he could see that and was desperate to escape.   

She came home expecting him to have disappeared every time. A note on the kitchen table, if she was lucky, a quiet empty house if she was not. She tossed and turned each time she went to bed but snatched sleep brought only dreams of green eyes and tanned arms that she longed to have wrapped around her. She woke one night, and stared at the ceiling. The bright moonlight struck through the curtains to cast long shadows across her room. Perhaps she should ask him to leave. Perhaps he was waiting for her to ask. Easier for them to be done with it all and go their separate ways. His arm had healed well. There was no godly reason he needed to stay with her any longer. And yet. She didn’t want him to go. And he hadn’t left. He was his own man, she realised that. He was headstrong. He would do what he wanted to do. And whatever the fretfulness that had descended, he was still here. She turned onto her side, seeking a cold spot to rest her head, seeking peace. What was she to do? She had no answer of course. There was no book to help her solve this riddle, no class she could go to or paper she could examine. He could see that in her, she was sure. Innocent. Ignorant. Didn’t understand that this was a dance and it was expected that she should have known the steps by now. If he asked her outright what she thought of him, felt towards him, what would she say? The truth, or would her words be curtailed by embarrassment and shame? The mere thought thickened her tongue.

Anxious and hot, she got up and went to the kitchen for some cold water. As she flicked on the light, she jumped when she realised Jaime was sitting at the table in the dark.

He twisted away from the lamp. “Switch it off—“

She did so, blinking back her night vision.

“Do you want something to drink?” she asked quietly.

“No. Thanks.”

“What are you doing up?”

“Same reason you are.”

He looked at her, in the moon lightness. She tried to read his face as she sat down opposite him, but it was all sown up, shutters down. He ran a finger round the rim of the glass, waiting for something. Waiting for her?

“You’ve been gone an awful lot, doll,” he said, finally.

“Work.”

She knew he was raising an eyebrow even if she didn’t see it. She didn’t believe her excuse either.

“Hmm. Not avoiding me, then?”

She shifted in her chair. “No! No… I just am really busy—“ _I just barely remember to breathe when I see you, I just can’t focus on anything else when you’re in the room, I just need to prepare myself for the moment you go so I don’t die of a broken heart._

“You’re good at many things, but lying ain’t one of them. If you want me gone, you’re going to have to say it,” he said darkly.

Her head snapped up, her rush of words bypassing her brain. “I don’t want you gone.”

He nodded after moment. “Good. I don’t want to go either,” he murmured into the sultry air. He lifted his hand and placed it gently across hers. They’d touched each other before of course, but she was no longer a doctor at that moment, nor he a patient. She let out a shaky breath.

Perhaps Jaime sensed her hesitation, and held back or perhaps there had been no holding back of anything and she was completely over interpreting everything, as usual.  In any case, she felt bereft when he removed his hand as he stood. He might have said something as he left her in the dark kitchen, but all she could hear was the rushing of blood in her ears as she tried to remember the warmth of his touch.

Another day. Another atmosphere you could cut with a knife. Another evening when you couldn’t move without sweating. Jaime huffed and puffed around her, restless with everything until he got it in his head to have a cold bath. The bathroom door slammed behind him and made her jump. How much more of this could she cope with? She put her head into her hands at her desk. Tried to breathe. Tried to remember a moment when she didn’t feel burnt and scratchy and when her life was simple.

A loud thump from the bathroom next door worked its way into her consciousness. She didn’t move for a minute, expecting to hear a volley of swearing. But nothing. Silence. Even after she called his name. The sort of silence when you know someone is in trouble. She leant her head against the bathroom door. She noticed her hands were shaking and told herself to get a grip.

“I’m coming in,” she said as she started to push against the door. He wasn’t in the bath, but instead sprawled on the floor, out cold and still wet. She blinked at his long, lean body with its tan lines and contrasting pale skin and her heart squeezed painfully.

“Jaime, can you hear me?” she asked, kneeling next to him so she could pull him round. “Jaime!” She shook him lightly. It did the trick; he started scowling and groaning. He struggled to sit against the wall, snatching at a towel to cover himself up in embarrassment.

“You fainted, I think,” she explained, reaching for a cloth to dab at a cut on the bridge of his nose.

“Seven hells, I cannot deal with this heat anymore,” he muttered. Having to deal with a godlike Jaime was not helping her temperature either. Her gaze stuttered down his trim torso, the ladder of his ribs leading to a flat stomach, brushed with fine hair and obscenely jutting hips before she could stop herself.

Act normal, Brienne. Even if it’s the last thing you do. “Nor me. This might be the coolest room in the house though.”

He looked at her in a way that made her mind spin. She was so close she could feel his breaths, see the specs of gold in his eyes.

“We should stay here then, like this—” he murmured.

She swallowed, rocking back on her knees. “It’s a hundred year event.”

“What is?” he asked, looking confused.

“The weather. The heat wave.”

He sighed, his brow creasing. “Are we really reduced to talking about the weather, doll?”

She couldn’t even look at him now. “How is your arm?” she persisted haltingly. “You might have concussion.” She stood awkwardly and reached over him into the cabinet for some iodine.

Her laboured breathing stopped the moment she felt a hand on her calf, fingers placed carefully round the muscles there. Jaime was staring up at her, gaze dark and mouth slightly agape. She was only wearing a pair of old scrappy shorts, legs red with sunburn, but he was looking at her like she was made out of gold.

“Brienne—let me in, will you? Let me love you the way you deserve—”His voice cracked with heartfelt desire as he leant forward and placed a kiss beside her knee. The bottle she had been holding clattered into the basin, fingers gripping the edge as he placed a second kiss, higher still. Her legs began to buckle—

The lights went out with a bang as a huge crack of lightening hit. Brienne let out a yelp as the room went dark, scrambling away from him.

“Brienne!” He stretched for her but she was already gone.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I know y'all been waiting for it to get hot and steamy... so read on!

The lightening continued with such ferocity it made her eyes scrunch against the sparking, hitting brightness. One bolt. And then another. And another. Drops of rain the size of saucers began to bump against the roof and the ground in a cacophony of sound from an apocalyptically red and purple sky. The earth trembled beneath her feet, dust thrown up in tiny hurricanes.

She ran outside into the middle of the garden, lifting her face to the warm drenching rain. She couldn’t think for the noise, although Jaime’s touch had marked her, his declaration captured tightly within her heart, making it sing. The sky was wrenching itself open but she didn’t feel frightened, only full of awe as she gazed up into it the immensity, blinking away the deluge— this is what she had been waiting for, she realised. Waiting for a break, a catalyst—something to spur her into action, make her leap into the unknown and trust herself that Jaime would catch her.

A hand on her arm, and he pulled her round to face him, breathing heavily. Water streamed down their faces and bodies and eyelashes. His clothes, haphazardly thrown back on, were already as sodden as hers were.

“What are you doing, you lunatic?” he shouted at her over the noise.

“It’s raining!”

“Is it?” he shouted back without hesitation, grinning, catching her delight. “I hadn’t noticed!”

She laughed. A no-holds-barred-head-back-full-on-laugh. It felt so good—her heart was flying after being trapped for so long. She looked back at Jaime, expecting him to be looking up at the sky. But he was looking at her like that again, pulling her closer with his injured arm round her waist. His thumb passed over her bottom lip, his own lips nearly touching hers.

“I want to kiss you properly,” he murmured against her mouth.

She gazed at him. One moment of bravery and she could have all she desired. Taking a breath, she pressed her lips to his. And then he was kissing her. _He was kissing her_. His mouth was hot and needy, and without restraint. Broken noses and chapped lips didn’t get kissed by him. Bodies without curves or grace didn’t get kissed by Jaime Lannister. But the sky was falling in and she was kissing him and he was kissing her.

They came up for air, panting as the rain beat on, endless and overwhelming. Fingers ran through hair, over skin and cotton as if to check it was not a dream, a mirage of the senses.

“We should go inside or we could drown,” he huffed into her ear.

She shook her head fervently, clutching at his shirt. “Not yet. _Please—_ I want to be out here, I-I-I want to feel like this forever.”

“What’s that?”

She stretched long fingers across his cheek, curved into his hair. “Alive,” she said after a moment, having to lean close to make herself heard.

He gave a long, smouldering smile at her revelation. “Thanks to you.”

She shrugged off his praise, her skin feeling fiery despite the rain, but the moment she glanced away in bashfulness he stopped her.

“Gods, every time you look like that it does something to me—“ and laughed at her startled, unbelieving face before bringing her to his lips again.

The storm continued above and all around them as Jaime mouthed at her neck and collar bone and shoulder. She felt hot and wet and light and heavy all at the same time as he pulled off her shirt to reveal a transparent camisole, her skin washed clean but electrified as he breathed and kissed and sucked— She began to work on the buttons of his shirt. A chuckle from Jaime and then her breath hitched at the shape his body made as he stripped it off. She smoothed her hands over the wide planes of muscle on his chest as she had so longed to do, nerves in pads of fingers and lips finding every scar and flicker of reaction as she clumsily copied what was doing to her. She could feel his heartbeat, rapid and solid, matching her own, the faint rumble of his groan when he ground her hips closer to his, the hardness there unmistakeable even to an innocent. She felt like she had been running, so quick were her breaths, her lungs burning in the cordite tanged air— She wanted him more and more, her need burning with the same ferocity as the tempest above them but despite the heat inside her, she shivered into a rash of goose bumps.

“Okay, doll. Inside before you catch your death.”

This time Jaime gently but firmly guided her back into the house, to her bedroom, knowing the way along the corridors even in the dark. He stopped at the threshold, but she pulled him in— she couldn’t let him go now, couldn’t force herself to button everything up again when they were only getting started. Others might gasp and titter at such wantonness; the sinful sight of an unmarried girl with a vilified man too shocking even to talk about in polite society, but they would be wrong, unbelievably, cowardly wrong.

“Jaime?” she asked as he stepped into the room.

“Yes?”

“You know I’ve never—“ she closed her eyes, her cheeks scorched. “—done this. You— I want you to—“

Not a beat passed before she felt him step up to her again, his mouth on hers. In the stormy gloomy air, they found their way onto the bed. Jaime marked his way down her body, pulling her remaining clothes off, raising his eyebrows teasingly at how eagerly she helped with his as well. He kissed the clammy skin of her inner thighs, the hot, close wetness of her cunt— her hands clenched the sheets, pulled them into a ragged state as she felt for the first time a keen mouth bring her to the unbearable edge she had only briefly sensed before by herself. After the noise outside, it was as if they were silent, but her pants and gaps filled the room as he licked and sucked and overwhelmed her into a freefall.

Her shameless final moan, shaped around his name, hung heavy in the air, and made Jaime give her a roguish, victorious smirk as he lifted his head from between her legs. She could only blink and breathe, watching as he deliberately licked his lips before his hand and tongue drawled infuriatingly slowly up her stomach and across her breasts until finally, finally he let her reach his mouth with her own. He shifted so he could lie beside her, propped up on the elbow of his injured arm to better use his only hand to stroke and cup and tease. His gruff reassurance given to her concerned question and touch that, no, it didn’t hurt, doc, but thanks for asking, didn’t quite hide the vulnerability in his look.

His fingers slicked scandalously as they slipped into her, her hips jerking and canting like he was controlling her from within, his name tripping over her tongue with shocked abandon as if nothing else mattered. Nothing did matter more to her at that point than his touch on her, _in her_ , and his unashamedly hungry gaze. He stole all her breath with possessive, forceful kisses, more demanding and more addictive than the teasing nips of tongue and lips outside. She listened and burned as he spoke with panted, clipped words about her and what she was to him and the power that was suddenly in her to do everything everyone had told her was quite impossible, impossible for _Brienne._

Then he was asking for something more and she looked at him, at the face deliberately lifted from the reach of her mouth, his gaze unguarded with expectation but matched in his confidence of her and she nodded, untangling her hand from his hair to push in between their damp bodies until it was wrapped round his cock and guided to stroke it, a rewarding stutter of her name into her needy mouth, echoed again and again as she learned swiftly what made his muscles tense so violently.

She whined more loudly when he pulled away again, a hand going to his shoulder to bring his heat and weight and smell of must and sweat back to her. But there was another question to be asked, this time with high spots of colour on his cheeks, an almost anxious haze in his eyes:  an easy yes, despite herself, despite everything. She knew him and he knew her and here they were, attracted and wanted and trusted.

Pain-clenched fingernails dug into his back and gasps of distress ghosted over him as he slowly pushed himself in. He stopped, smoothed tendrils of hair from her glowing forehead and shifted her hips upwards. She swallowed and nodded at his query, trying not to clench, _breathe!_ , as he filled her. A gentle rhythm with its deep tug of her core eventually overcame the hurt, nudging her slowly, differently towards that indulgent prize again. His moans though were louder still, leaving her faintly puzzled at how it all felt for him, and she rocked to his faster thrusts with him, limbs wrapped around his sweaty torso until his hips faltered and pushed so deep within her that she cried out with him.

He panted on top of her for a moment before rolling off with a grunt. Hot, sweaty— oh, her skin felt almost bruised and scalded. Her fingers reached down to her inner thighs to find them sore and sticky with blood. She glanced at Jaime next to her, eyes closed, cheeks pinked and hair astray. Her own muscles were drained but her insides throbbed, nerves sparkling from the newness of such feelings. She reached for a sheet to cover their legs, still intertwined. Then Jaime shifted next to her, ignoring how she tensed, shy at the state she was in. He kissed her temple, breathing in her wet hair before reaching with his arm to pull her to him, eye to eye and skin to skin again.

The embers in his gaze continued to burn hot, a smile pulling one side of his face up. “That was just what the doctor ordered, I hope?”

She huffed an embarrassed laugh. “Did you also— also enjoy—even though I wasn’t—“

He scrunched his face up against hers, his voice aroused and aggrieved. “You were, you are _glorious_ , Brienne _._ Every goddamn inch of you.”

She would have him explore every inch again and again, if he was willing, she thought as she gazed back at Jaime. The thought of giving him pleasure in return, of finding out what made him see stars brought a frisson of electricity through her core. But just at that point, tiredness was pulling at her eyelids with a greater urgency. She pressed a tender kiss on him, buried her head into the crook of his neck and fell into sleep.

Rain drops continued to thrum lightly on the roof above their heads, the promise of a cool, fresh morning ahead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Y'all want an epilogue?!


	7. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I shouldn't promise something when it's not even written so I apologise profusely that I kept you waiting.
> 
> Anyway, I hope you enjoy!

Feeling faint, Brienne sat heavily on the edge of the bed and covered her face with her hands. She tried to find a steadiness in the gradual darkness encroaching the room but her breath didn’t seem to stay long enough in her lungs to make a difference. She could hear Jaime padding around; he’d just come in from another long day harvesting.

He’d taken over the running of the farm from her old tenants who had retired to Florida, finding solace and healing in the fresh air and honest work. She felt the change on his palm, on his fingers as they became calloused, rough against her skin when he touched her. Her soul squeezed irrationally at the tan lines that appeared on the back of his neck and on his arms. He was happy now, she thought, at peace. It seemed a lifetime ago, that huge storm, how her body had first found his. But he’d shared her bed every night since, and taught her many things. Her appetite for Jaime, for his fingers and tongue and muscled grip, was ravenous once awoken. There had been one particular moment where she’d dragged him from the field into the barn one sunset after missing each other for days, urgently kissing away his dirty laugh as she pushed him onto the hay. Jaime had licked his lips and watched with lust filled eyes as she unbuttoned his shirt, unbuckled his jeans and swung her leg over his groin, thankful she was wearing a skirt that day. He had groaned as she took him in her hand and then in her, before he reached to hold her hips and grind against her. She had ridden him, fiercely and shamelessly until they cried out together, dust motes brilliantly hanging in the shafts of light.

She shut her eyes against the memory, a tug of sharp fear behind her heart that she hadn’t felt in a long time.

He barrelled into the room but jumped when he spotted her there, sitting in the dark. “Jeez, you trying to give an old man a heart attack? I thought you were at work?”

She couldn’t look at him. “I got my times mixed up.”

“Doesn’t sound like you?” He appeared in front of her, his hand passing over her cheek.  “What’s wrong?”

It was uncanny how well he could read her, right from the moment they met. And she had sought such comfort at not having to try to put everything into struggled words. But now, she just wanted a defence, a little more time.

“Brienne?” He prompted, kneeling. His gaze bored into her, darkened with concern. “Are you sick? You’ve not been yourself for days—“

She sighed sharply, suddenly unbearably frustrated with everyone and everything, but mostly at herself. “I know what’s wrong with me. I’m…I’m pregnant.”

She saw something register on his face before her vision blurred. The tears came fast and hot, her choked cries filling the room. Saying the words made it horribly real, her last bits of composure evaporated. She was faintly aware in her immediate misery that Jaime was still in front of her, being unnaturally quiet and still.  She didn’t even imagine she could get pregnant. For all her professional knowledge, she thought otherwise of herself, of her own body and its series of failings. But now— she stood unsteadily. She tried to resist the urge to apologise as she passed him, but her mind was unravelling as quickly as every nerve began to tense.

“I can’t be a mother. I just can’t.” An ugly silence settled as she came to a sudden stop in the middle of the room.  “There are options,” she muttered. “I can fix this.”

“I’m not having you die on some backstreet doctor’s table.” Jaime voice behind her was low. He sounded furious.

Brienne spun round, spat her response. “Both our mothers died _giving_ birth!”

In the flaring of Jaime’s shocked expression, her face crumpled again. She brought her fist to her mouth to stifle the sobs. She wanted to run away, to reach out to him, to never have started this conversation.

“That’s not going to happen to you.” She heard her wounding of him in each word.

“You don’t know that! I see terrible things every day. Mothers, babies – lives lost in an instant.” She moaned. “I can’t do this— I won’t be any good— I should have been more careful— this is all my fault—“ Her words were rasped, snatched.

“Brienne—“ Although Jaime took a step forward, his hand hovered as if unsure for once how he should touch her. She sensed his panic, his growing denial and forced herself to confront it.

“We’re not married. To be a father. To be tied down. To a kid. This isn’t what you want, is it? You didn’t want it before, with your other kids. I don’t blame you if you want walk away. Forget this. You can go, you should go—“

“Enough!” he roared as he grabbed her arm and shook her. They were face to face and she was almost frightened of him, his eyes black and jaw set so hard it was trembling under the pressure. She panted with difficulty as he stared at her. “Where are you getting this nonsense?” he snarled. “I would never leave you—“ She wheezed, her mouth opening and closing as her chest tightened unbearably. “Brienne?” his voice suddenly softened as she struggled for air. She put her hand on his arm to steady herself against the flickers of light passing across her eyes—

“Jaime—help me—“ And then she found herself soaking into his arms and into the blackness.

She was in bed when she awoke. Night, and the room was lit by a single light in a far corner.

“Jaime?” she murmured fretfully, her body full of ache and her head heavy and sodden. She wanted to cower from the guilt that stalked her mind at hurting him.

A creak of a chair. “I’m here,” he said after a moment, his weight appearing next to her. He looked older, drawn in the shadows. His face twitched, hand running through his hair. “Why didn’t you tell me before?” he blurted out. “Goddamn it, I thought something was seriously wrong.”

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. The apology hung limply between them. “I tried and tried and then it just got so—” Her voice broke.

He bit his tongue and sighed instead. “The doctor says you need to rest.”

“The doctor?”

Exasperation made his lips thin. “You’re expecting and you blacked out in my arms. Of course I called the doctor.”

She couldn’t breathe, yes. A tremor still resided within her.

“So you should sleep.” He stood up, tense and distracted. “I’ll leave you in peace.”

She blinked abruptly at the distance he was putting between them. She levered herself up with difficulty. “I never thought I would be in this position,” she started with a waver in her voice. “I persuaded myself that I didn’t want a-a- family of my own.”

He watched her carefully, but it was too difficult to match the intensity in his gaze and her own dropped.

“Then I found you. And I don’t want to leave you behind. This baby risks that.”

To her ears, she sounded stubborn and ridiculous. She hated how emotional she had become, unreasonable.

His shoulders softened. “You don’t need to be scared, doll.” Jaime sat back down, closer than before, a finger under her chin so he could see into her soul.

_Scared_. Yes, he was right of course. She was scared as hell.

“You’re the strongest woman I know. You put up with me every goddamn day, don’t you?”

She smiled weakly at his joke. “I should never have said those things about walking away to you. It was unforgiveable of me.”

He scoffed. “Forgotten already. I am not going to pretend I have the best track record in fatherhood, but I’m not going to skip out on you, Bri.”

She grimaced in shame. “I know that, really.”

“The kid is going to be the luckiest to have you as its mother.”

“Yeah?”

He heard her unsureness. “Ahh, doll, you got to stop torturing yourself. For the millionth time, it’s going to be—“ he bent forwards, pressed a kiss against the bitten, worried lips of Brienne. “—okay.”

****

Jaime groaned into his pillow when his son started bawling for the third time that night. Brienne sat up, yawning. March was nearly coming to an end, and the spring was turning into a warm one. Flicking on her bedside light, she went to his cot and picked up the jerky, floppy body of a new born with a-hold-your-breath-care. He was so new, with the softest of skin and a whorl of black hair, but still his fingers knew to grasp onto her nightdress, his crying to settle to the sound of her heartbeat.

“Shh, shhh—“ she whispered. “Why so loud?” Dark eyes watched her, everything beyond her face still a blur. She sat awkwardly in a rocking chair, leaning back as he latched on and the milk flowed. He snuffled contentedly at her breast, just like millions of other babies to their mothers just at that moment. She still couldn’t really believe she and him and Jaime had made it. Her body had actually seemed to enjoy the pregnancy, despite everything. She felt well. Energised. Jaime had given her an insufferable “I told you so” roll of his eyes every time he caught looking at her bump in the mirror as she changed before bed, before reaching for her and expending some of that energy. She shifted, recalling the sweat that dripped down them through the frozen nights as her belly grew, the heightened intensity she felt from each and every one of Jaime’s touches. He put such efforts into making her feel worthy, even as the hospital made her resign. A pregnant, unmarried doctor was a scandal too far for this small town. Jaime had fumed alongside her, until a call from his lawyer brother had _persuaded_ the authorities that Brienne would indeed have a job to return to. It all appeared faintly ridiculous to her, as if it were all a mirage of contentment, a peek through someone else’s window into a family life she still didn’t really believe could be hers. That is, until the very real pangs of what would be turn out to be a long and excruciating labour kicked in, sending her gasping to the floor once again. But then she’d had her son handed to her, and finally, finally something settled within her heart.

She looked at the prone shape of Jaime in the shadows, and then back at her son. She smiled softly.

_Her boys._  


End file.
